Chair Method/Sleep Lady Shuffle - Success for my God Awful Sleeper

[amcillwain]

@snapdragons_ Makes sense!! One more question! When he would wake in the middle of the night, did you wait a certain amount of time before resuming your position in his room or would you go in immediately?

Thank you for answering my questions! This is very helpful

 

[snapdragons_]

@amcillwain No prob!! I went more with intensity rather than an amount of time. So like if he crossed from whimpering/soft crying into what I would call sobbing I would go in.

 

[brhal]

@snapdragons_ Oh my god, this couldn't be farther from a boring over share! Thank you so much for this! Hearing gentle method success stories is exactly what I need to finally find the courage to do it and knowing you have a LO that seems to match the temperament of mine (escalates to crying so hard she'll puke when I leave) is even more encouraging! Would you mind just very briefly summarizing how exactly you implemented the chair method? I know the basics of this method but would love some more "real life experience" details from someone who successfully pulled it off

 

[snapdragons_]

@brhal Yeah of course! So first three nights I was right next to the bed soothing with rubbing back, patting bum, etc

Night 4-6 my chair was in the middle of the room trying to use only my voice

Night 7-9 my chair was by the door again using only shushing and my voice

10-12 my chair was in the hall but door open so he could see me

Then nights 13 and on I just put him down and left (and then obsessively watched the monitor until he fell asleep)

 

[brhal]

@snapdragons_ Thank you! Does the approach say anything concerning "if LO cries for x amount of time / crying escalates to x out of 10" - call it / intervene? I'm curious because I could easily see my LO cry for hours or scream bloody murder when I'm sitting right next to her but not pick her up how bad did the crying get for your LO and did it ever escalate to a point where you "broke the rules" or did you stoically sit through 10/10 screaming at any point?

 

[snapdragons_]

@brhal No I am the furthest thing from stoic!!

So I my (4 minute long) experience with Ferber showed me what a true 10 looked like. He was crying so hard he could barely breathe and I could not handle it at all.

Never in any night of SLS did he reach that level. He yelled at me. And sad cried a lot. Especially the first two nights. Or when the position changed. But it was never as bad as it was when I left the room during Ferber. And that’s kind of what told me this was the right approach for us. I know some babies are the opposite where the crying stops sooner if parent is not there and a parent presence is escalating. So this is just what worked for us.

I definitely patted bum and rubbed back a lot during first few nights and even when my chair was across the room there were still times I went to the crib for a quick bum pat if he was really upset.

I picked him up once on night two when he kind of “fell” from sitting to laying and sacred himself.

But I will say the book was really forgiving about being flexible with that kind of stuff which I liked so I never felt like “oh I ruined it”